universe in which we habitually live. And finally there is the true or rational self, in which alone we feel that we can rest with satisfaction-the "Christ" (to adopt the Pauline metaphor) that liveth in us, and in whom we hope more and more to abide. And, as it is said elsewhere "his service is perfect freedom." It may, in a certain sense, be maintained that there is no other perfect freedom. The only ultimate self is the rational self; and the only ultimate freedom is the freedom that we have when we are rational. This, however, is a point that cannot be fully understood until we have considered the nature of the moral ideal.

The significance of all this may perhaps become more apparent as we proceed. In the meantime we may now sum up the results at which we have arrived with respect to the nature of Conduct or Voluntary Action.

§ 13. THE NATURE OF VOLUNTARY ACTION.-A definite illustration may perhaps help to make the nature of the various elements in voluntary action clear to us.

Take the case of the desire of food. The first element involved in this is the mere animal appetite. This we may suppose to be at first a mere blind impulse analogous to the organic impulse by which a flower turns to the light; but it is distinguished from such a vegetable impulse by the presence of consciousness. In this consciousness there are two main elements

1 Even this may not be quite simple. "Zwei Seelen wohnen, ach! in dieser Brust," said Faust (“Two souls, alas! live in this breast of mine"); and the same could, in some degree, be said by most men. "I am double," said Renan; "sometimes one part of myself laughs, while the other cries." In cases of madness, the two selves often become very distinctly separated,

the ideal presentation, in vague outline,' of the object striven towards, and a feeling of pleasure and pain, The latter feeling is twofold: there is a sense of pleasure in the anticipated satisfaction, and a sense of uneasiness connected with the consciousness of its absence. Thus in the appetite of hunger there is a peculiar craving, partly pleasant and partly uneasy, accompanied by a more or less vague consciousness of the kind of object that would yield satisfaction.1 Desire is distinguished from mere appetite by the definite presence of a consciousness of the object as an end to be aimed at. The appetite of hunger involves a vague uneasiness, a vague consciousness of the kind of object that would remove the uneasiness, a vague anticipation of pleasure in its attainment. Desire of food, on the other hand, is a definite presentation of the idea of food as an end to be sought. In this presentation, as in the more vague presentation of the object in appetite, there is also involved an element of pleasure and pain. The object thus definitely presented as an end in desire is what is most properly understood by a motive. Such motives may conflict: the ends involved may be incompatible with one another. Hence the desires governed by these motives may remain in abeyance. The object presented as a desirable end may not be definitely chosen as an end-i. e. it may not become a wish. A wish is a desire selected. It is a desire on which attention has been concentrated, and which has thus secured a certain dominance in our consciousness. The wish for food is more than the mere desire for food. It is a concentrated desire. But even this is still not an

1 It is open to doubt whether this element is present in the animal consciousness at all. Cf. above, chap. i., § 3.

act of will. An act of will involves, besides, a definite purpose or intention; i. e. in an act of will we do not merely concentrate our attention on an end as a good to be sought; but, in addition, we regard it as an end to be brought about by us. The purpose of procuring food-the intention, for instance, of working for a livelihood-is more than the mere wish for food, more than a mere prayer or aspiration. Will, however, involves, further, an actual energising. A purpose or intention refers to the future, and may not be carried out. In an act of will the idea becomes a force. How this is done is a difficult question to answer; and, happily, it is not a problem that we require here to solve. We have merely to notice this element of active energising as involved in an Act of Will. The man who wills to procure food does not merely intend to work, but actually does exert himself. Finally, character is a formed habit-e. g. the habit of activity in some particular industrial pursuit.'

1 Mr. Stout's article on "Voluntary Action," already referred to, should be consulted on several of these points.

2

NOTE ON RESPONSIBILITY.

In modern times the interest in the question of the Freedom of the Will has been stimulated mainly by the desire to have a clear view of human responsibility.1 The Medieval conceptions of Heaven and Hell gave special force to this desire. God was thought of as a supreme Judge, standing outside the world, and apportioning infinite rewards and punishments in accordance with the lives which men had led, or, as some rather thought, in accordance with the beliefs which they had entertained. This doctrine presented serious difficulties. On the one hand, if Liberty of Indifference were asserted, if men were supposed to have the power of acting "without motives," of choosing a particular line of conduct without reference to their characters-i. e. to the universe of desires within which they have habitually lived-this appeared to be both unintelligible in itself and to involve too strong an assertion of the freedom of a merely created, finite, and dependent being. On the other hand, if man were held to be free only in the sense that he is self-determined, it appeared as if he could not be regarded as ultimately responsible for the building up of his own character, for the selection of the universe within which he was to live. This difficulty was felt as early as the time of St. Paul; and the only solution of it seems to lie in the acknowledgment that it is a mystery. Credo quia absurdum.

A similar difficulty, however, comes up even at the present time with reference to the responsibility of the individual to society. How, it is asked, can any one be regarded as responsible for the formation of his own character, seeing that he is born with particular inherited aptitudes and tendencies, and that the whole development of his life is determined by the moral atmosphere in which he is placed? In a sense we choose our own universes; but the "we," the self that chooses, is not an undetermined existence. We are ushered into the world with a certain predisposition to good or to evil in particular directions. Over this original sin," or original virtue, which lies in our disposition from the first, we have no control. It is ourselves; it constitutes the particular nature which we inherit; and the directions in which it moves us depend on the circumstances in which we grow up. How, then, is society entitled to punish us for our offences? Even so firm an upholder of personal independence, and so stern an advocate of the punishment of crime, as Thomas Carlyle, admitted, and even insisted, that a man's char

66

1 Cf. below, Book III., chap. vi., § 7.

acter is an inheritance, and that the development of it is affected by bodily qualities. Thus, notwithstanding his strenuous insistence on the doctrine that every man is the shaper of his own destiny, we find him, in his Essay on Sir Walter Scott, making this candid admission: "Disease, which is but superficial, and issues in outer lameness, does not cloud the young existence; rather forwards it towards the expansion it is fitted for. The miserable disease had been one of the internal nobler parts, marring the general organisation; under which no Walter Scott could have been forwarded, or with all his other endowments could have been producible or possible." What, then, becomes of responsibility? Have we not here a puzzle or antinomy as real as that with which the Mediæval Theology was perplexed? But the answer to this has been partly seen already. If a man were a mere animal, the only reasonable course would be to take him as we find him. In that case, the only justification of punishment 1 would be found in the hope of effecting, by means of it, some improvement in the disposition of him who is punished. But a man cannot regard himself as a mere animal, nor can a society of men regard its members as simply animals. They must be regarded as beings animated by an ideal, which they are bound to aim at realising, and which they can realise as soon as they become aware of the obligation. No man could regard it as an excuse for his evil conduct, that he is a mere brute beast, who knows no better. Nor could a society accept this as an excuse for any of its members. Whether a God, sitting outside as an external Judge, ought not to accept it as an excuse, is quite another question, with which we have here no concern. Our question is merely with regard to the way in which a man or a society of men must judge human conduct. And, from this point of view, it is quite sufficient to say that men must regard themselves and others as soldiers of the ideal; that those who fail to struggle for it must be treated as deserters, and those who deny its authority as guilty of lèse majesté against the dignity of human nature. There is no stone wall in the way of a man's moral progress. There is only himself. And he cannot accept himself as a mere fact, but only as a fact ruled by an ideal.

I cannot hope that such remarks as these will remove all difficulties from the mind of the student. The question, however, when pressed beyond a certain point, begins to be rather of metaphysical and theological than of strictly ethical importance.2

1 See below, Book III., chap. vi., § 6.

2 A complete discussion of this difficult question would evidently